Celebrating Good News For the Earth More Often

As many of you know, I have a long-standing passion and commitment to making the world a greener place, and I know many of you do too.

One of the mistakes that I feel some environmentalists make is not taking the time to give progress updates on changes that are positive. Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute is someone who I like to follow because he shows both the challenges and successes that we face today.

I was inspired today by a blog Lester Brown wrote called Plan B Updates: The Great Transition, Part I: From Fossil Fuels to Renewable Energy. In it, he wrote about the progress that’s happening around the world in the energy sector. It’s because of visionaries like him and many others that there is hope in our future. Our world can be a better place.

I share this update with you as part of my own plan to balance articles like last week’s post on the XL pipeline with ones like this one. We still need to challenge policies and actions that are short-sighted, but we also need to celebrate the positive changes that are being made not only by environmentalist, but by capitalists as well who are creating wind energy, solar energy and other sources of energy around the world.

I believe that the more we can heal and strengthen the earth, the more we help ourselves. Here’s to more good news for our planet earth!

Daily Contemplations:

Are there any signs of progress in your world that you are not celebrating enough?

Do you have hope for the relationship between humanity and stewardship of the earth?

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16 thoughts on “Celebrating Good News For the Earth More Often”

Good point, and good question. More celebrations are needed vs. the doom and gloom we often hear (from me, too). The biologist in me is often pessimistic, knowing how nature finds a way to correct an imbalance, but for some reason, on any given day, I tend to be optimistic. No doubt there is much more I could be celebrating if I paid attention. Thanks for the splash in the face, I needed that…:) Focusing on success would probably create an environment that motivated others to succeed, and after all, are we not always looking for a reason to celebrate? You really have me thinking…

Thanks so much for your comments. Yes, nature does sometimes have ways that could be devastating for us, which can give rise to doom and gloom thinking. When I look at all the ecosystems that are on the edge of sustainability around the world it does does worry me and inspire me to do what I can to reverse those trends in my small ways. I have to remember that nature can also show great resilience that benefits us and resides wtihin us too. It is tough some days to remain positive. I like what you write about being optimistic despite all of the challenges we face. My belief is that the optimism can be helpful.
Glad this post got you thinking today! :)

I’ve been feeling very positive about some changes in my town. My neighbors moved out, and we have been cleaning up their yard, mostly because we’ve been looking at the mess for 7 years and can’t take another sec. But it feels SO good to work over their! Like a community project, although it’s only us and the land lord lol. But I do imagine what it’ll be like when we are all a little greener, myself included.

Aaron, good for you! That’s great work that you’re doing to make your part of the earth greener. We don’t always have to be doing something that brings us accolades as long as we know that we’re making a difference. Yesterday I was cleaning out my garden and preparing it for the winter, and that felt like my contribution to caring for the earth this week. I’ve been doing a lot of clean-up in the last few months and it feels so good to see the best of a place emerging!

I went to a talk recently by Jonathen Porritt and David Guest on
a film called Inconvenient Truth 2 – you can find it on You Tube.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eb0nLOyyr7U
It was very positive showing what can be done and is being done in places like Sweden.

Thanks for your link. It was fascinating to watch another story of progress, though he certainly began with a sober portrayal of why we need to keep working on this issue. The progress in the continuously decreasing price of photovoltaics is definitely one sign of improvement. It looks like I should be learning more about this work.

I like the introduction of topics closely connected to following “good news” for the earth. It makes for very inspiring reading and gives prompts for further discussion with friends and family. Very nice, Karen.